Imperial Tobacco had no credibility when it denied cancer link, ex-spokesman says

Imperial Tobacco had “no credibility” with the general public beginning in the 1960s when the company claimed smoking did not cause cancer, a former spokesman testified Tuesday in the $27-billion class-action lawsuit against Canada's three largest tobacco companies

MONTREAL — Canada’s largest tobacco company had “no credibility” with the general public beginning in the 1960s when Imperial Tobacco claimed smoking did not cause cancer, a former spokesman for the company testified Tuesday morning in the $27-billion class-action lawsuit against the nation’s three largest tobacco companies.

“The reputation of the company was very bad,” Michel Descoteaux said. “Public opinion was that cigarettes were causing all kinds of diseases.”

Descoteaux said he began working for Imperial Tobacco in 1963 and for years was its only spokesman. He retired in 2002.

He said that during the 1960s and 1970s he was aware of no tobacco company in the world that admitted that smoking caused such diseases as cancer and emphysema.

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He said his personal beliefs always evolved with the policy of the company and added that if his opinions had been opposed to the company’s position he would not have lasted long at Imperial Tobacco.

He said the company’s public statements on the health issues of smoking evolved from total denial of a direct relationship between smoking and cancer to admitting finally that some people got diseases because of smoking.

The reputation of the company was very bad. Public opinion was that cigarettes were causing all kinds of diseases

He said he didn’t know if company scientists had any role in setting the company’s policy on the health hazards of smoking.

When plaintiff lawyer Bruce Johnston asked him why he didn’t make it his job to find out the truth about smoking and disease, he said: “That’s a good question.”

He added, however: “I got my information from people who were serious and honest.”

Still, he said: “you had to be blind not to see that nobody in the public believed us.”

Descoteaux is the plaintiff’s first witness.

Rothmans Benson & Hedges and JTI McDonald are also defendants in the case, which could last up to two years.

The case involves two classes of plaintiffs. One represents about 1.8 million smokers who claim damages of $10,000 per plaintiff for their addiction. The second involves 90,000 smokers who have contracted cancer or emphysema. They want $105,000 each.

More than 10,000 people die each year in the Canadian province of Quebec from causes directly linked to smoking. Quebec’s annual healthcare spending on tobacco-related ailments tops $1-billion, according to the Canadian Cancer Society.

A confidential memo dated July 11, 1979, from Descoteaux to Jean-Louis Mercier, former president and chairman of Imperial Tobacco, was entered into the record and shows that Imperial tried to involve employees in campaigns to counter government regulations in Quebec and Ontario that the company believed would harm their sales.

“We have an interest in engaging the enthusiasm of our unionized employees, to support them ‘technically’ and to ‘frame’ their actions to assure that their policies and those of the company are the same,” the document states.

The document also talked about making sure that the company’s policies on smoking and health “conform to the policies of the international industry.”

Descoteaux claimed that “international industry” referred to the company’s largest shareholder British American Tobacco. BAT now owns 100 per cent of Imperial Tobacco.